The newly completed plant will create up to 200 high-tech jobs, said Dr. Patrick Soon-Shiong, the company’s founder and chairman.

“When all is said and done, this will be a $100 million investment,” he said.

Abraxis entered the Phoenix market in July 2007 with its purchase of an 18-acre site from Watson Pharmaceuticals. While Abraxis continued to operate the former Watson plant, it built the adjacent 25,000-square-foot structure to total 200,000 square feet at 620 N. 51st Ave.

Then, last year, Abraxis invested $15 million into Catapult Bio, a nonprofit philanthropic organization that launched earlier this year in Phoenix to grant funding to help commercialize late-stage discovery research, said Catapult CEO MaryAnn Guerra.

“The funding we provide under our program requires any expansion be done in Arizona,” Guerra said.

Soon-Shiong said he is now investing efforts into Abraxis Health.

The Phoenix plant has the capacity to produce more than 10 million units and can expand to 20 million -- enough for worldwide distribution, he said.

The company’s drug, Abraxane, has received approval from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration and 38 other countries for treatment of metastatic breast cancer. It is in Phase III clinical trials for treatment of pancreatic, melanoma and lung cancer. Dr. Daniel Von Hoff, senior investigator for the Translational Genomics Research Institute in Phoenix, is the principal investigator of the pancreatic cancer trial.

Robert Green, president and CEO of the Arizona BioIndustry Association, said the opening of the Abraxis facility is another major success for the Arizona bioscience community.

“What could have been a major failure, the closing of the Watson facility, has actually turned into a big win,” Green said. “The landing of a firm as prestigious as Abraxis surely gets noticed in the industry and helps build our international reputation. Our job now is to welcome the staff and ensure they are integrated into our community.”

Saundra Johnson, executive vice president of the Flinn Foundation, said 200 high-paying jobs and having cutting-edge cancer treatments produced locally are good news for Arizona.

“The fact that Abraxis Health and Patrick Soon-Shiong chose Phoenix for major investments is a testament to the development of Arizona as a bioscience hub,” she said.

Soon-Shiong said he chose Arizona because he was impressed with the commitment of city and government officials to the growth of biosciences in the state.

“This is a great opportunity for us to really create a flagship facility for nanotechnology,” he said.